Eyes Into Her Soul
by VerelLupin
Summary: Spoilers for Resident Evil: Retribution. He sees who she is, he always has. It why she never let him in but can she now with the world so lost?
1. Chapter 1

**Let me start with the fact that I will go down with the Carlos/Alice ship.**

**This the ending I would have liked to see.  
**

**I'll be honest after 3 the franchise was dead to me but I saw four on dvd and thought it was okay then I heard he was coming back for five. I squealed and laughed like a nut. Then I saw five and I cried through out the whole movie for what could have been.  
**

**I came home depressed and with great need for fanfiction. There is not a lot of them so I decided to write my own. So I've only played the games a few times as they scare the shit out of me and so have no idea of the characters back stories. All my ideas and knowledge come from the movies.  
**

**I can only hope that he comes back for the sixth. My mom said I should focus on the fact that he came back at all. I'm trying but damm he was so awesome...need Kleenex again.  
**

**Enjoy...and sorry for the long note. This is my first story for RE so all errors are mine.  
**

* * *

"You're all going to die down here."

When the homicidal bitch had uttered those words a second time, Alice had ignored it. After all she had nobody or anything else that she truly wanted to protect anymore. His eyes had stopped shinning long ago so what difference did it make if she died here or there.

In fact that had dawned on her when she was in that plane heading to Alaska. She had wanted to make a life after she found out Spence was a bastard. She'd wanted to make a better world after Matt and Kaplan were taken from her.

But all those desires and wishes had been blown right out existence along with the always kind and heroic, Olivera. Her whole life had become about taking out Umbrella and after the fighting cost her Carlos, Alice had stopped wanting anything at all.

Yep every single lose had taken bits and pieces of her emotions but it wasn't until that day in the heat of Las Vegas when Umbrella took her over that she was left empty.

Of course she thought she was hollow but that was before Alice saw the perfect life that the sinister corporation, operated by that bitch queen, had put together. Before she saw what was left of the other Alice, before she spotted the tall, dark and handsome other Carlos, in his white coffee-stained work shirt and black suit pants and the horrible mutation that distorted his jaw line and gave him infected eyes, dead and next to the broken Alice.

Before she saw the matching bands on the unfortunate couple and before the other Alice's daughter called her mommy.

After she saw all that Alice began to want again.

She pushed the child to gather a few things from their home and looked around envying the poor dead Alice. Her fight was over; she would never have to run again. She would never have to relive the death of her loved ones or be killed by them, at least not this one.

She picked up one of the frames and the longing and love came rushing back with such force, for the man grinning while celebrating a birthday with his daughter alongside Alice but not Alice, that she almost drowned in the unfairness of it. She glanced briefly at the other picture but the crushing wave of sadness of their demise kept her from studying the happily wedded couple.

This was not her house, that was not her child and she would never be able to call Carlos her husband ever and it was all Umbrella's fault. It was all her fault for not being faster or stronger or braver.

The child, Becky, asked if she had been fast in her packing and the way her eyes had crinkled when she asked forced Alice to swallow the lump in her throat and say she was. Ada told her that the child was a clone but given how sick and twisted Umbrella was, Alice wouldn't put it past them to have mixed her human DNA with Carlos' to make the bond between Clone Alice and Clone Carlos more authentic. She knew the way his eyes expressed themselves and Becky had those same expressions.

They gathered their stuff and stepped outside and Alice once more saw the magnitude of Umbrella's evil. Standing a few feet away were her old comrades. One, together again, Rain snarky but alive, Jill controlled but breathing and then she saw him.

She couldn't even utter his name; her breath was so stuck in her chest at the sight of his tall form and the twin pools of dark brown. She didn't linger on him; his eyes were dead like a shark's. He wasn't the real Carlos so she appealed to Rain but she was not the real Rain either and to them the child was not any more real than they were.

She was told to allow them to take her and they'd spare the child and she almost did. During the second she allowed herself to drink him in. In the second she stared into those unsmiling eyes, she almost gave in for the sake of the child hoping to appeal to his old decency but then Becky asked what was wrong with her father and those dark eyes blinked in surprise.

That simple acknowledgement was enough to pull Alice back and she told Becky that the man standing with a gun pointed at them was not her father. She turned and Ada nodded and the gunfight began. They crouched in the house and they traded shot after shot while trying to escape.

One of the bullets came disturbingly close to Becky's head and Alice enraged searched for the culprit. She saw that remorseless gaze again and she immediately fired upon it. He read her deadly intent and dove out of the way just in time for the man behind him to be turned into swiss cheese.

He didn't bother to fire again and Alice and Becky fled. They were separated and found and separated again and again. They got out and fought and then were rescued from the cold and taken to the heat of the last stand inside the white house.

She agreed to be the weapon; after all she had a daughter to protect.

"Alice?" the girlish voice called.

She turned and met the white clad queen. "I'm glad you made it out."

"Thanks, your sister is a bitch."

"Yes, her programming is corrupted."

"Yeah, that's one way to put it."

"Alice, there is something I must tell you about the clone." The white queen said and beckoned her into the president's office.

"Her name is Becky. She is not a clone, she is my daughter."

"That is what I need to tell you."

Alice crouched down so as to not miss a word of what no doubt would shatter her world further. "She is a clone but she is really your daughter. She was made from a mix of your and his DNA and then grown in the lab. After she perished she was cloned, that is why the other Alice's and Carlos' were always so protective. It is written into their DNA."

"Does she have any of my traits?"

"No the clones were all made from before the HIVE. When you were still just an operative."

"They have all their employees, don't they?"

"Yes and my sister will not be stopped easily. She will clone him again. She will clone her again. They are your weaknesses and you've shown it."

Alice sat down hard and tried picturing herself putting a bullet in his head or hers and knew that the white queen was right. She wouldn't be able to do it.

"I can't do it can I? In all the simulations he killed me because I couldn't kill him."

"That is correct but you have no cause to worry."

Alice laughed humorlessly. "I don't, tell me why?"

"Because I saved one that will fight alongside you."

"You promised that you would end it." He said from the doorway.

Alice looked up and was lifted into warm and safe arms. Arms that were part of someone she thought she'd never see again. "I tried. I almost did."

"It's a good thing I'm here to help then." He said and hugged her that much tighter.

"Daddy?" Becky asked hurling into the room and straight at what she assumed was her father.

"Daddy?" Carlos asked, looked down at the brown haired girl gripping his leg and back to Alice.

He swung the child into his arms and he saw the wide smile that was identical to his. Eyes that showed emotion like his only they came in Alice blue.

"It's a long story." Alice said hugging them both.

"I can see that." He said but cuddled the child anyway.

"Mommy, is this really Daddy?" Becky asked searching the man holding her.

Alice looked up into the dark eyes, whose humor and charm had haunted her for over four years. Eyes that she had last seen vacant and ruthless while these eyes now twinkled with a familiar spark that she hoped could be love, if she allowed it to blossom, if she allowed them in.

She lifted her hand and signed yes.


	2. Chapter 2

**I wasn't going to make this a chaptered story but all the reviews gave me ideas. Now this one is a little darker but there's a reason for it.**

**I don't like movie Leon, he seemed a bit of a jerk. So my writing reflects that but I will be nicer to him later on. (bit of lemon if you squint. I suck at them) Also some language...I apologize in advance.  
**

**Enjoy.**

* * *

"Food is ready if you guys are hungry," someone informed them. After a few minutes they let go of each other, hyper aware of just close they had been even with Becky between them.

"I could go for a decent meal."

"Wesker's in charge, I'm sure it will more than decent."

"How about you munchkin? You hungry?" he said to the little girl.

Under normal circumstances Becky would have probably agreed to just about anything as long as her parents didn't leave her again but the poor kid had been through so much that she was fast asleep and therefore missed her father's question.

"Why don't you let me keep her and you go eat." He said adjusting the child higher on his shoulder. "I'll get something later."

"You just said you were hungry?"

"I am but I'm not feeling a whole lot of acceptance from the group you came with."

"What?" she asked wondering who the hell had the audacity to make Carlos feel unwelcome. "When did this happen?"

"Earlier but its to be expected. I am a clone. Some of the soldiers aren't particularly happy about that. Especially the ones that knew the real Olivera."

Alice didn't know what to say. She had loved Carlos with all her heart even though she'd only known him for a few months and she was still adjusting to having him back in her life, clone or no. She could imagine how difficult it must be for the people who had actually known him before the outbreak.

"How much of his…"

"Memories?"

"Yeah, memories. How many of them do you have?"

"Very little. The red queen wanted everybody scrubbed to keep them loyal. I only have some."

"Such as?" Alice asked curious as to what the white queen thought important.

"Some training. Trying to save a woman on the roof of an office building. Our first meeting in Raccoon City and you injecting me with the anti-virus. I remember Claire's convoy and being bitten by L.J. I also remember a kiss. You kissed me?"

"I did," she answered glad that they'd chosen to give him that memory even if it had been a brief moment in their lives, well not his. "Still not a whole lot to work with."

"I think it was meant to be that way. So you wouldn't dwell." Sadness filled his eyes, "does it bother you that I'm…not him?"

"I never expected to see him again. What I saw in the Tokyo facility tainted what I remembered." She cupped his cheek wanting to reassure him, "you are him in some way. That's enough for me."

"Its not enough for the others."

"Well it doesn't matter what they think. I've gone to hell and back and so did you. I say we deserve a little bit of happiness."

"I make you happy?" he said his face lighting up.

"Yeah now come on and lets eat, I'm starving."

"Yes ma'am." He saluted as best as he could with one arm occupied by their child.

**White House Staff Kitchen**

"Its just weird. I mean I'm happy for her but I don't understand how she can…he's not Carlos." Claire said absentmindedly stirring the soup in front of her.

"It's wrong. I worked with the guy and now I have to pretend to make nice just because Wesker's pet project wants something to bang?" Leon snapped.

"Christ, Leon. What the hell's the matter with you? Do you know what that woman has gone through? What Umbrella has forced her to do?" Jill asked glaring at him from across the table.

"We have all gone through the ringer not just her but even I can understand the powers that be and they have good reason to keep the pet, as you say Leon, happy." Ada answered.

"Regardless he is here to stay and from what I know others will be brought back. Not just him." Chris stated.

"Yeah but he's the only one getting treated like he's real." Claire said.

"Look you don't want to talk to the guy, that's fine. Nobody is going to force you but Alice did get most of us out of Umbrella's clutches in one way or another. You know this," Chris directed the last statement at his sister who bowed her head. "Let her have him for as long as she can. Let us all do what we can to stay human, who knows how long we have."

"I don't give two shits what the hell she does with it. All I know is that getting her out costs us very good friends. Barry was one of those friends and he was killed by one of her motherfucking Carlos clones. So don't expect me to just welcome the asshole with open arms!" Leon said slamming his palms flat on the table.

"Leon, is it? I'm glad you're so honest. I like it its refreshing." Alice said coming in with Carlos trailing awkwardly behind her with Becky still asleep in his arms. "Don't you thinks so?"

Leon got up from the table and Carlos glared at the man daring him to come closer to his little family.

"You plan on saying anything or does she do all your talking for you. You sure as hell do all your own killing, don't you?"

"I'm not gonna argue with you, considering I have my daughter in my arms. I'm sorry for your friend but I didn't kill him. Believe it or not even clones can be different." Carlos said and proceeded to sit as far away from him as possible. Chris moved over to make room and the two began talking. Alice shot Chris a grateful look and he winked at her.

"Leon may be an asshole but he has a point. Can you trust him?" Claire asked quietly getting between Leon and Alice, who looked like she was ready to take him out if he so much as breathed in Carlos' direction. "Ada told us about the other clones and the scenarios that Umbrella was running and that had to be pretty confusing for you but a clone is not the same as the real person."

Alice stared at Claire as if she'd grown another head. "Who are you people? Are you really this blind? We are fighting an all out war to keep from becoming extinct and you're going turn your nose up at free help. He is everything Carlos was. He has his skills and memories but most of all he has everything that made him a decent human being. He has free will and thoughts just like you."

"I know how much you loved Carlos but that's not him. Carlos died in the desert in an explosion to keep us free from Umbrella not for us to get cozy with it." Claire said but Alice didn't miss the way the other woman's eyes swept over his form.

"You think that's all this is? That poor Alice has cracked and needs refuge in the arms of a clone because she can't handle the reality? I was trapped in my own mind and used like a puppet. I had to kill a sweet little girl because I was told to, do you know what that feels like?"

Jill got up and left the room.

"I had to watch you and Kmart and Chase and Mickey get attacked while I stood frozen. I had to watch L.J. bite the real Carlos and you know what Redfield, I want to pretend that you are saying this as a friend. I want to believe you aren't just saying this because you were in love with Carlos too and he never gave you the time of day but you know given how you're staring at his clone, I'm not sure."

The room grew quiet as Alice took Becky from Carlos. "Alice…"

"I don't have much of an appetite it seems," and with that Alice left the room in stunned silence.

"I didn't know she knew about Carlos and I." Claire said sitting back down not daring to look at the man on her right and seated next to her brother.

"I'm sorry if I made anybody uncomfortable." Carlos said getting up and taking his plate. "I was meant to be a help. I know many of you probably knew me I mean him. I just want you to know that I'm not meant to replace him in any way." He quickly gathered another plate on top of his and left the room.

"Well that was a clusterfuck." Leon muttered.

"I don't remember you being such a dick before. You sure you're not a clone?" Chris muttered getting up and following behind Jill, Alice and Carlos.

"Congratulations Leon, you've already divided the team. The Red queen will be very happy, Wesker not so much. Remember Alice is not expendable but you are." Ada said and resumed her lunch.

She didn't miss the way Leon's face paled.

In the president's office Wesker monitored the heated conversations in the kitchen with glee. "They are already fighting amongst themselves. Perhaps introducing Olivera was not a good idea," the queen said observing the remaining group.

"No this is perfect. Exactly what I wanted. Alice does not need them. I don't want her dependent on them at all. It's always been the relationships with other survivors that have turned her against us. The child and Olivera will be our way back into Project Alice."

"Olivera doesn't remember much, won't that be a problem?"

"No, let him make his own memories with Alice. That way he'll be easier to control."

"As you wish." The girl answered and disappeared.

Alice roamed the white house until the ever-present projection of the queen popped up. "I can show you to your room."

"I don't want anything from you right now." Alice growled struggling to carry her daughter.

"Becky needs rest as do you. Let your daughter be comfortable."

Alice sighed and followed the queen to a suite of rooms. "Nothing but the best, eh?"

"Would you like me to direct Olivera here as well?"

Alice laid the girl on the bed choosing to fuss over her daughter and ignore the queen.

"Very well. Goodnight Alice. Sweet dreams."

Alice snorted and she turned to close the door only to find the last person she wanted to see standing at the door, "can I come in?"

"I don't think that's a good idea. I haven't had a decent night of sleep in years and Becky is pretty tired-"

"I'd like to talk to you." He said stepping into the room. He placed the two plates he'd been carrying on a side table and closed the door behind him.

She backed away not sure why she was so hesitant to have him near when a few hours ago she'd been in his arms. **'Maybe it was that he seemed so much taller, so much more defined. Had Carlos always been this devastatingly handsome? Had the queen enhanced him somehow?'**

"Carlos…"

He towered over her and it dawned on her that somehow they'd bypassed the room where Becky slept and were now in the adjoining room. "I like how you keep saying my name."

"What?" she said confused as to why she was feeling so hot. Did someone turn up the heat or was it just the way his eyes were eating her alive.

"Do you want this?" he asked but he couldn't really want an answer, not with the way he was caressing her neck and stroking her pulse with his thumb.

'**Why am I allowing this?' **

"I know that I want…but if Claire and you…him and what if she's right." Her sentence became more disjointed as he applied kiss after kiss to her collarbone while steadily trapping her body between his and the wall.

"Alice, I'm not him. I never will be but I do know one thing." He raised darkened eyes and she waited with baited breath.

"What do you know?" she said either holding or pushing at his arms, she wasn't sure anymore.

"All the memories and everything that was him, tells me that I need you. I want to discover that for myself. I want to love you as me not just as an echo of him." He cupped her face and she wondered why it was she seemed destined to hurt him.

"What if I can't see past that?" she said suddenly afraid of how much she wanted to wrap her legs around him and let him have his way with her and consequences be damned.

"Give me a chance." He kissed her softly, barely brushing his lips across hers. "Will you give me a chance, Alice?"

She raised herself on tiptoe and kissed him back just as softly. "I will."

The night was filled with the quiet sounds of clothes falling and bodies meeting for the first time. Kisses that bruised and loved. Hands that gripped desperately at war roughened shoulders and delicate hips that shuddered with every stroke of energy.

Sight, touch and taste sampled olive and pale complexions and every combination that joined the two. Sound and smell were overwhelmed with needs that should have created the perfect being asleep in the next room.

Voices lifted and said names that were consumed by hungry and needy mouths that begged to be drunk from.

Carlos brushed a sweaty lock of hair off her face admiring the woman beneath the survivor, beneath the project that would save them all. He admired how her eyes glinted back the barely contained edge in his own eyes that said they weren't quite done yet.

"I was made for you," he whispered falling into the push and pull of her body.

She groaned arching gracefully into his embrace and unable to stop the love for this man from taking her over as easily as Umbrella had done in the desert. Except she didn't fight it, she wanted to overflow with everything that made up Carlos Olivera.

She would happily give herself over to him and did. Neither one held back.

Senses lit up and gaps where filled in allowing the clone to be revealed for the reality he was. Not a vessel but the true man thought long gone. "Carlos," she said and happy tears slid down her face.

"I could never leave you," he admitted truthfully.


	3. Chapter 3

**I'm totally looking forward to watching RE:R again. I need to refresh my memory plus I do love my Carlos in any form, good or bad.  
**

**Enjoy...**

* * *

"Mommy?"

"I'll get her. You sleep." He said placing a kiss on her forehead.

"You'll come back?" she said tugging him back into the bed.

"Maybe."

"Go on, then." She said and drew the blanket over her head. She heard him ask Becky if she wanted breakfast and the little girl answer. "Pancakes, daddy," with the enthusiasm only a ten year old could have. **'He's a goner.'**

"Pancakes it is."

Alice peaked from under the blanket and watched as Carlos swung Becky around making the little girl squeal. Becky clung to his neck without reservation and the sweetness of the scene made it impossible not to participate. "I can't sleep with you two making such a racket."

She pretended to throw the blankets in a huff and Carlos put down Becky, who ran and threw her arms around her mother's neck. Alice hugged her back and the little girl pulled away and began rapidly signing, "didn't mean to wake you mama."

"I'm not really mad. I'm just playing. Breakfast?"

"What about the monsters?" Becky signed.

"Monsters?" Carlos asked.

"We'll protect you." She signed motioning to herself and Carlos.

"You won't go away?" she signed including her father.

Carlos bent down so he was at her eye level. "I promise," he said.

Becky tapped the earpiece and signed. "Needs batteries."

Carlos looked to Alice and she made the motions with her hands so he could communicate with their now truly deaf daughter. "I promise," he signed following Alice's instructions.

"Ok," she replied.

He got up but didn't carry her. He wanted to at least attempt to have a private conversation with Alice so he let Becky walk along in front of them. "You know that long story, I need you to tell it to me now."

"I'll give you the basics. You supposedly died in the desert. I found a bunch of clones of me and we attacked Umbrella's facility in Tokyo. Wesker got away but I snuck on board his getaway plane and the bastard injected me with the anti-virus, which took away my abilities."

"You're not infected anymore?"

"Let me finish. The plane crashed. I though I was dead but I've been mutated for so long that I'm practically indestructible, even without the virus. I headed to Alaska but found nothing but empty planes and Claire Redfield, controlled and with no memory."

"Claire is here?"

"Something you need to tell me?"

"I'll tell you my story when you finish yours." He said.

"You're the one who keeps interrupting." She said ignoring the tendril of jealousy creeping through her at his non-response. "There was nothing in Alaska expect ice. We flew to another distress signal which took us to L.A."

"It's still standing?"

"Not so much. We crash landed on a prison and met other survivors. Found out Arcadia is a ship not a location. We attempted to contact them but kept getting this automated message."

They reached the kitchen and both were glad to see that aside from Jill, it was empty.

"Good night's sleep?" Jill asked drinking what looked like her third cup of coffee.

"Best I ever had." Carlos answered honestly.

Alice muffled a laugh and took their daughter to a small buffet set up on the side.

"Should I even ask what that was about?"

"Probably not."

"So. How are you Jill?"

"You really are just like him, aren't you?"

"Can you keep a secret, Valentine?" he asked winking.

"Son of a bitch!"

"What! What's going on?" Alice turned with guns raised only to lower them at the sight of the usually restrained former S.T.A.R.S. officer practically draped around Carlos.

"Oh my god! It is you, but how I mean I heard from everyone and you had clones and…"

"Wow. I don't think I've ever seen her speechless." Alice muttered sipping her own cup of coffee now that Becky was devouring a stack of pancakes.

"It's a long story." He said, "but I want to know what happened to you guys before I tell it."

"I don't remember a lot. I was being controlled for most of it. I left you and roamed for a while after Angie…"

Alice looked at her daughter and put down her cup. "I'm so sorry, Jill. I know that Angie was like a daughter to all of us but you especially and then I-"

"I made peace with that a long time ago. It wasn't your fault. I saw you trying to fight them. Angie wouldn't have wanted you to leave or feel guilty and I know I wasn't the only one that missed you." She glanced meaningfully at Carlos.

Carlos gripped both of their hands. "I missed both of you."

Jill squeezed his hand back, "I met up with Chris and found out that even with the world slowly going to hell that Umbrella was still after you. I contacted an old F.B.I buddy of mine, Booth, and he negotiated for my surrender to the F.B.I."

"They left L.J. and I alone after that. I assume you claimed all responsibility for the Raccoon City tape."

"I did. I was detained in Washington D.C. then I was en route to Guantanamo but we were intercepted by Umbrella and the rest is a blank until I woke up with Alice and Leon in the snow."

"You don't remember fighting me?"

"I remember flashes and not whole scenes. Its like I'm watching somebody else use my body. I saw the house and the clones. I saw Ada and Rain and me running and the other Carlos get swept up by the tidal wave. I saw you get hit by Rain but no fight."

"What are you thinking?" Carlos asked. He knew Alice and she only got quiet when she was suspicious of something or someone.

Alice responded, "the spider controllers had to come from somewhere and I don't buy the whole Wesker is only in it to save humanity. I wouldn't be surprised if Jill being controlled was a test run. Let's face it aside from you and me, who else has a stubborn enough personality to defy them."

"Claire survived it, didn't she? You said she was here."

Jill saw Alice tense at the name of the redhead though she wasn't going to acknowledge it. Whatever fight was going on between those two was not her business and she didn't want to get pulled into any kind of turf war, she had enough on her plate.

Obviously Carlos was aware of the situation as he reached out but Alice ignored his hand, "she is here but she took much longer to remember. I'll start from there. After we crashed into the prison, Claire and I found a group of survivors."

"Prison?"

"You better start all over." Carlos said and refilled his plate since Alice was ignoring him.

"Ok, Carlos died in the desert, or so I thought…" Alice began

Jill nodded along and gasped in horror and cursed when appropriate throughout the story. "You landed in the prison and then what?"

"We met survivors who thought Claire and I were going to bring them to the Arcadia. That was when we realized Arcadia was a ship. At some point the undead crawled through the sewer of the prison and emerged in the showers. One of the guys, who was a pervert and was trying to watch me shower…" Carlos cursed in Spanish but even Jill and Alice knew that word, "alerted me to them."

Alice patted his hand apparently no longer upset, "they had a guy that claimed to know the way out but only if we let him out of the cage the others had put him in. He said he wasn't an inmate but he'd been put there as a joke by the other guards. Apparently in the chaos they forgot all about him when the prison was overrun."

Becky who had already finished eating and had been watching her mother intently decided she'd rather be in between her parents than at the side of them. "What happened to the man?" she signed.

Jill looked taken aback as Alice signed to the girl speaking out loud as she did so, "he was telling the truth."

"Is he ok?"

"Yeah, he's alright. He's here with his sister. You can meet him later."

"Chris was the man with you?" Jill interrupted.

"Yeah. His original idea didn't pan out cause some selfish weasel of a Hollywood agent, if you can believe it, double crossed us and took the plane. We ended up going through the sewers and they led us out to the shore where we found a boat and headed to the Arcadia."

"Chris, Claire and you are all that made it out?"

"I recently found out Luther, a former football player made it out too. He died protecting Becky and I when we escaped the red queen."

Carlos glanced at Becky; unsure of why it bothered him that Alice sounded upset the man had died. Clearly the man had saved Alice and their daughter and he knew realistically he'd been gone so long that he couldn't really fault her if she fell for someone else.

And if he was honest with himself, ever since they parted, he'd been worried that what they had after Raccoon City had been just a fling. Sure last night had cemented their love but he couldn't help feeling like he'd missed more than he could ever make up for.

"Once on the Arcadia, Chris, Claire and I fought a very mutated Wesker and some dogs."

"I hate dogs." Jill and Carlos said in unison. They looked at each other and laughed.

"Anyway I thought I had killed him but he manage to eat the slimy Hollywood agent that made it out, irony right, regenerating him long enough to take off… with a bomb. Again he managed to escape that and then renounced Umbrella or was overthrown. I don't know."

Jill shut her eyes remembering a flash of memory, "he was the one that took you out of Umbrella Prime and rescued you and the rest of us."

"He sent a strike team which included Leon and Ada." Alice said.

"Claire mentioned scenarios which involved Carlos, what was she talking about?"

Alice lifted Becky onto her lap and Jill immediately understood. Carlos did also but he wanted to know exactly what it was that Umbrella had done, he wanted to know exactly how related to Becky, he and Alice were.

"Hey how about we get out of here and see what we are up against." Jill said distracting the trio from their grim thoughts.

"The monsters are here?" Becky signed frantically.

Alice signed back. "Don't worry. Aunt Jill will protect you just like your daddy and I. Jill, I know it's a lot to ask-"

"Don't sweat it. Come on Becks, let's look around the place." Becky slid off her mother's lap and took the blonde's hand looking back at her parents for reassurance.

"We'll be right along." Carlos said and Alice signed.

The words seemed to calm her and she disappeared with their friend. The silence in the room became heavy after their departure and both adults filled it with awkward starts.

"Alice-"

"Carlos-"

"You haven't told me how you survived that explosion?"

"What simulations was Claire talking about? And why does Becky refer to the undead as monsters?"

"They are monsters and up until a few days ago, they didn't exist for her." Alice explained.

"What?"

"It was one of many simulations. The Red Queen had mock-ups of Tokyo, Moscow and New York. She used the DNA of Umbrella employees and turned them into clones that she used as guinea pigs. She ran different outcomes to study how the t-virus infected the world."

"What does that have to do with me and you and Becky?"

"Becky is the genetic child of Alice Prospero & Carlos Olivera. When the real Becky died, she was cloned, like you and me. The three of them were put into these scenarios. I was in their house, saw their wedding picture, Becky's tenth-year birthday celebration."

"My god! Did you see them?"

"He was in a work shirt with black pants, he was everything she…I wanted and he was bitten. She was in jeans and a checkered shirt with long blonde hair. She fought him and managed to kill him but she died at his hands either way. It happened a lot. They were right next to each other even in death."

"Alice."

"Becky didn't see them. She thought I was her mother. When we tried to escape with Ada we ran into what I call "Bad Carlos", he didn't know her or me. She asked me what was wrong with her daddy. He looked surprised but he didn't lower his weapon. You would have lowered your weapon."

"That's enough. I don't need to know more."

"That bitch had a whole room, a whole fucking room of you and me and her, of us. Ready to kill over and over again, they felt love and fear and she kept killing them anyway." She got up from the table and began pacing. "She asked me if I was really her mother…in that room."

"What did you say?"

"What could I say? It's bad enough that they've screwed with all of us. That Umbrella and Wesker and the Red Queen and the White Queen had been lying from the beginning but to create a life just to toy with it, to make our interactions that much more real."

"Does she know what happened to her parents, the ones from the scenario?"

"No, I didn't allow her to see them. I hated that I had to see you that way, even if I knew it wasn't you."

"Did you destroy it?"

"I hope so. The White Queen is not so sure. She said her sister will clone you or her again. I can't kill either one of you."

"Which is why I was brought in, so you wouldn't have to choose. What do you want me to do?"

"Carlos, I don't know what to do. I'm not a mother. I never could be. I'm too fucked up but we are all she has. I can't do this alone."

Carlos stopped her pacing and forced her to look at him, "listen to me. You are not alone. You have me and you also have Jill."

"What about Claire?"

"I need you to know that nothing happened between Claire and I. We spent a lot of nights talking but that is it. If she believed otherwise, then I am sorry for her. I made it very clear early on that I was already taken."

She laughed but it came out more like a sob. "Why must you be so cheesy?" He shrugged and she burrowed into his shirt, "in case you're wondering, Luther was only a friend. A good friend but nothing else."

"I didn't say anything."

"You didn't have to. I've spent enough time with you."

"After last night, I don't think there's anything about me you don't know."

"Eww, get a room." Chris said eying them with disgust.

"I could say the same to you and Valentine." Alice shot back.

"Whatever. Speaking of Valentine, you might want to relieve her of your kid. Apparently she's very good with a gun and the fact that a ten-year old is beating her is not sitting well with her. I told her that she shouldn't take it too hard given who her folks are."

"I bet she told him to fuck off." Carlos quietly said to Alice, who was still in his arms.

"Want to go rescue Jill from Becky or should we let her suffer?" Alice asked.

"How about we pretend to rescue her and then watch her suffer." Carlos suggested.

"Wow, I'm impressed Olivera." Chris nudged him and led the way to where Jill was currently being driven up the wall.

"This is a whole new side of you." Alice said to Carlos, following behind Chris.

"Hey bad Carlos had to come from somewhere," he joked.

Alice rolled her eyes but couldn't keep the smile from her face. Chris took them through several corridors but the more they walked, the more the three realized how truly trapped they were.

After the maze of hallways they came to the end of one particularly long one. The door Chris opened at the end of it, came out into an underground garden that was equipped with artificial sunlight and mimicked the outdoors.

The light blinded them for a moment then they saw Jill and Becky.

Girl and woman had long sniper guns and laid on perfectly raised turrets taking out undead after undead. Their precision was indisputable as more infected fell beneath their bullets. Even now Alice, Carlos and Chris could see the White Queen was observing quietly while a soldier brought forth a more stylized gun and handed it over to Becky.

Carlos and Alice saw exactly what was upsetting Jill and it was not that Becky was better. It was just how good Becky was. Alice was worried and without meaning to clutched Carlos' hand. "You know what Jill told me the first time she met me?"

"Nobody's that good."

"Exactly."


End file.
